Thursday, March 10, 2005

311: No Stone Age Unturned -- Coombs 2005 (308): 4 -- sciencenow

Stoneking and his team compared Mlabri DNA with that from neighboring tribes. Astonishingly, all of the Mlabri mitochondrial DNA turned out to be identical--a total lack of variation that hasn't been found in any other human population. As hunter-gatherer societies are thought to have less genetic diversity, the lack of variation suggests that the Mlabri descended from a hunter-gatherer culture. However, unlike other hunter–gatherer groups, the Mlabri share genetic information with neighboring agricultural hill tribes as well as other agricultural groups in Southeast Asia.

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The results, published this month in the journal Public Library of Science, Biology, demonstrate that "hunter-gatherers have changed and evolved, particularly in response to interactions with agricultural groups," says Stoneking.

Humans evolved as they transition from foraging, to agriculture, and back to hunter/gatherer. Evolutionary hypotheses tested.